You Are Not Alone
by Dev Nine-Asher
Summary: What if the Face of Boe's last cyptic message meant someone other than the Master? Set after Journey's End. Fluff! ?/Ten


**You Are Not Alone**

-

1/1

-

_"Why do you just accept all this pain as your due?"_

The Doctor jerked awake at the all too clear sound of a voice in his head, and succeeded in falling off the jump-seat in the Tardis control room where he'd pretty much collapsed in exhaustion after leaving Donna with her grandparents.

Hitting the floor, metal grating and all, from a not-inconsiderable height, only made him groan. He didn't have much left to do anything else, not after what he'd been through, not after what he'd given up -

_"And why did you have to give anything up?"_

The voice again.

Normally - well, what was normal for him, anyway - he'd jump up, and freak-out at what sounded like a quiet telepathic voice in his head, and immediately set about finding its source, where and who it came from, because it was just so rare, and so totally unrecognizable.

The Doctor moved his forehead from the painful grate onto his outstretched arm and closed his eyes against the excruciating emptiness of the room. Knowing he was completely alone was more hurtful than the one gigantic ache his body had become.

_"You saved the universe once again, and what do you have to show for it? More pain. Why do you do this to yourself? Why do you just let anything and everything good that manages to come your way, go?"_

The voice wasn't going away, that much was certain. Sighing, the Doctor rolled over onto his back, wincing. He didn't bother to open his eyes. There was no one there he had to face.

"If I answer you, will you leave me alone?" he asked the air amiably.

_"Why? It's the last thing you want to be, isn't it? Alone?"_

The Doctor most definitely was not in the mood for games of any kind. In fact, he was descending into such an ill-mood he wondered if he would go racing straight past 'rude' and become downright 'belligerent', though to become downright belligerent he usually had to be drunk, and when he said drunk, he meant by far more than the mere human standards, he meant absolutely, quite literally, _pickled_ -

_"Hmph. Well, you do have yourself to talk to,"_ the decidedly female voice conceded.

"But I just do it _so_ well," the Doctor agreed.

_"I'd wager there isn't much you don't do well,"_ the voice seemed to mutter resentfully, and the Doctor gave up.

Sitting up much too quickly, he groaned again, blinking when his hair flopped forward and stuck in his eye, and he brushed it back impatiently, only to have it flop forward again.

_"You're going to need more gel if you want that to stay up,"_ the voice pointed out helpfully, _"that or a hair cut,"_ and the Doctor scowled and slowly forced himself to stand, ignoring the itchy sting in his eye.

"Allright, the day a voice from nowhere starts giving me hair-tips is the day I've finally lost it, and by that I mean my sanity, not my intelligence. So, just who are you?" he demanded, leaning forward to rest his weight on his hands, holding himself up on the console.

_"You mean you don't recognize me?"_ the voice sounded hurt.

"No-_pe_, sorry." The Doctor answered impatiently.

After a long moment, in which the Doctor thought the voice had finally gone away, it came back, even louder and stronger than before, one voice and a billion all-in-one, for just an instant, and then impossibly it suddenly sounded like...

"No," he whispered faintly, his tired eyes stricken.

_"Oh, my poor Doctor. It's me. It's Rose."_

-

The Doctor didn't pass out, because that would have been just downright embarrassing, but he did sit down rather hard, right back where he'd been on the grating, and it took him a minute - or quite possibly, _decades_ - to blink away the black spots in front of his eyes, and find his tongue again.

"You're not Rose,"he said harshly, closing his eyes and shaking his head against the hope that had risen. "I left her - "

_"Yeah, I am, well, part of her anyway, and yeah, you did leave her, you useless tit! You think I don't know that? It hurts almost as bad as watching you right now, what you're doin' to yourself!"_

The Doctor's mouth fell open, and he looked around the console room, gob-smacked.

_"Excuse me, did you just call me a 'tit'?"_ he asked very indignantly.

_"Don't complain, I could come up with worse!" _the voice threatened.

The Doctor stood up, sneering into thin air, "Try it!"

_"Mood I'm in, you couldn't take it, you stubborn old wanker!"_

The Doctor sputtered, unable to take in what sounded like his sweet Rose calling him 'old'. Feeling ridiculously hurt, he lowered himself into the jumpseat and rubbed his hands over his face, and tried very hard to convince himself he wasn't going mad.

_"Doctor?"_ the voice finally asked hesitantly.

"Oh, what is it?" he asked, the forlorn sound of his voice matching the look in his eyes as he lifted his head and stared off at nothing in particular.

_"Oh, don't look like that,"_ the Rose voice groaned gently. _"M'sorry, Doctor, really I am."_

"Sorry for what, calling me a tit, or calling me a stubborn old wanker?" he asked bitterly.

_"Ugh, there it is again! How do you just do that? It's always driven me bonkers!"_

"I'm confused."

_"Your eyes! That-that thing! The bedroom eyes thing!"_

"Wha-wha-? _What?! _I do _not_ have bedroom eyes!"

_"Uh, yeah, ya' do. It's not fair the way you look at a girl with those things. 'S the only reason I couldn't completely hate Martha for falling for ya'. Girl couldn't help it."_

The Doctor got up to pace. "Oh, Rassilon, please don't tell me a disembodied-voice is coming on to me."

_"I have a name, y'know,"_ the voice reminded him impatiently.

The Doctor moaned. "No, you aren't real."

The voice made an exasperated noise. _"__You aren't half-thick, are you, really? Of all people, I'd never have thought you would be so hard to convince I'm really here. You believe most anything, rest of the time."_

"Oi!"

_"Well, I am her. The Bad Wolf part of her. Remember? All that is, all that was, all that ever could be? That's me. I'm still here, I always have been. But you've gotten yourself in such a state I couldn't just watch any longer."_

"So...you're just that, a voice. A voice with memories, and a little consciousness." The Doctor sounded disappointed.

_"No, I'm more than that. I bring life...remember?"_

There was a blinding flash of golden light, and the Doctor lifted his hands to shield his eyes for just a second before dropping them, and blinking in disbelief.

"Rose?"

Rose stood in front of him, looking just as she did the last time he'd seen her with his previous incarnation's eyes, a little younger, a little blonder, same Punky Fish jacket, the same...everything. She _was_ Rose.

"My Doctor."

"I...but how?"

"I create myself." She shrugged, her body tense, as if she was afraid of something, as if she might bolt at any moment.

"A message," the Doctor murmured, remembering, recalling what she'd told him then, how she'd annihilated the Daleks.

"Yeah," she said nervously, one hand coming up to fiddle with the collar of her jacket. "I also left a message here, well, not really a message, but a path - look, I can't explain it all that well, you're the brilliant one. I just left a part of myself here, with the Tardis, in case you ever lost me, and you needed me back. That's the only way this works, you know."

The Doctor stared at her, his breath suddenly coming in shallow rasps. "You've been here all this time, then? Through Donna, through Martha...through everything?"

"Yeah." A tear streaked down the radiant skin of her cheek.

"You couldn't speak to me? Not once in all this time?!" The Doctor's voice got steadily louder, accusing, sounding raw, his expression completely unguarded.

"I'm sorry! I knew what would happen to me - to _us_," she corrected with a sniff, "and I knew about your other companions, knew then that you would be able to move on, you always do." She took a tentative step nearer to him. "So I made it that I couldn't interfere with anything, not unless you got to the point that...not until you really needed me," she said quietly. "And then, today - "

The Doctor took a slight step towards her, too. "I did."

Rose nodded. "You did...but I might have given myself a little push, using the Tardis, I mean. She was scared for you, too." More tears flooded over, dripping from her jaw-line. "M'sorry, Doctor, but I just couldn't stand to see you like this, not if I could help - "

"My Rose," the Doctor said faintly, and then he had her in his arms, holding her tight against him, burying his face in her glowing hair which was fairly drenched with vortex energy.

"Can I help?" Rose asked with a small sob, shuddering so hard against him that it felt it in his bones. Small hands clutched the front of his coat, nails digging in hard.

On the verge of falling apart himself, he put a hand at the back of her head and held her close, lips near her ear.

"Oh, Rose, you do help, you always did. You always save me."

Giving a small half-whimper, half-laugh, Rose turned her head and kissed his cheek. It was warm and wet, messy with lipstick, and it felt wondeful.

"I'm only here as long as ya' need me, so d-don't feel bad if I suddenly go away, allright?"

Backing off far enough to tip her face up to his and look into her eyes, he shook his head, his expression managing to look awe-struck and solemn at the same time.

"I won't feel bad, Rose Tyler, because I'm going to need you forever. Can you give me that? Forever?"

Rose bit her lip, nodding. "I can," she said with a shaky smile. "Guess you're stuck with me."

The Doctor smiled back, his wide, slightly manic grin. "Forever then. Me and you."

Rose laughed. "The Doctor and the Bad Wolf!"

-

_End_

-

A/N: Hm, fluffy! Well, that was my very first Dr. Who fic. It's weird because I always told myself I wouldn't start writing in that fandom. I was pretty insistent about it, actually. In fact, I actually promised my husband I wouldn't. Can't remember why, now, lol. I think I was scared I couldn't get the characters right. Maybe if my muse is kind I'll get to write some more. If anyone is wondering, the title came from the Face of Boe (hope that's spelled right), and yes, it does mean to say that Boe was giving the Doctor a hint about Bad Wolf/Rose, and not the Master. I always wanted that to mean something else, lol. Anyway, thanks for reading, and any comments are most welcome and appreciated, and many apologies to my ol' Spuffy readers. My Broken Origin series is still in the works, it's just coming along slowly. Very...and I'm sorry, but blame it on Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant, dammit.


End file.
